I have long nurtured this thoroughly
depressing conviction that the United States, far from being a shining
city on the hill, has become one of the most corrupt of nations.
Why does America have more lawyers than the rest of the world combined?
It is because the corruption has been institutionalized at every level
of political life and is protected by laws and procedures created
precisely
to enable elites to maintain dominance over the rest of us.
I appreciate that my viewpoint may be regarded as somewhat simplistic
as I am neither a judge nor a lawyer, and I do concede that many of
those
in the legal profession are both honest and dedicated to the
Constitution. Still, the bad taste of the past 11 years continues to
remind
me that there is something seriously wrong with how our political
system and rule of law operate.

Take, for example, the issues of lobbying
and political contributions. Lobbying, which essentially consists
of advocacy on behalf of groups that promote their own interests at
others’ expense, is legal and even encouraged at the federal, state, and
local levels in the United States.
It distorts the perception of the public interest and lines
the pockets of both the lobbyists and those who possess the
resources to commission the lobbying. The politicians who are
corrupted are frequently rewarded after their terms of office expire.
Lobbying rarely serves the people of the United States, and in many
parts
of the world it would be regarded as what it in fact is — a particularly
pervasive form of political corruption.

And then there is the corruption of
the system caused by the perceived need by politician-aspirants to raise
vast sums of money to get nominated and elected to office. Once
in office, the politicians reward their financial supporters, awarding
ambassadorships at the top end, providing patronage-level government
jobs lower down the food chain, and relying on earmarks to generate
returns in a more direct fashion. Does anyone seriously think
the casino magnate Sheldon Adelson’s funding of Republican presidential
candidate Newt Gingrich with tens of millions of dollars is disinterested?
Adelson is a passionate Israel-firster, so much so that he has said he is ashamed of having served in the
U.S. Army and would prefer to have the Israeli Defense Forces on his resumé.
Gingrich is his man because Adelson perceives that Newt will do Israel’s
bidding in the Middle East. It is as simple as that. Rick
Santorum is likewise largely funded by multi-millionaire Foster Friess,
who recently described the best method of birth control as an aspirin
placed between a woman’s knees. He will no doubt cash in his
markers if the nomination and electoral process are successful for his
candidate.

And as for the impartiality and “blindness”
of the law, fuggedaboutit. Repeated attempts to get the Israeli
lobby AIPAC to register as an agent of a foreign power, as required
by law, have failed because the Justice Department refuses to do what
is right when confronted by a powerful constituency, no matter how strong
the case against it may be. Or if you or I were to
go to our neighbor’s house, tie him to a board, and force water up
his nose until he thinks that he is drowning, we would be sent to jail
for many years. But when the government does the same thing, the
White House gives the perpetrators a pass, even though the activity
is clearly illegal under international law and according to the U.N. Convention Against Torture, to which the United States is a signatory. The
entire matter is brushed off, with the president and attorney general
claiming in a high-minded fashion that they are looking forward rather
than backward, a convenient subterfuge to hide behind when not enforcing
the law of the land.

And if you are the government and want
to kill an American citizen without any due process and without any
regard for the Bill of Rights, you get an obliging Justice Department
lawyer to draft a memo. If you want to pluck someone out of
his home and send him to a military prison for the remainder of his
days without any recourse or appeal, you insert language into a defense
appropriation act that is then dutifully passed by Congress and becomes
law. If you choose to stage a lethal drone attack on a country
with which you are not at war, you declare it a “constabulary” action.
All legal and neat. Obama and Holder’s condoning criminality
has apparently morphed out of the change that some believed in back
in 2008, and, quite frankly, we the people have been shafted by the lies
of yet another slick politician aided and abetted by a corrupt and venal
Congress.

You might consider challenging
the government on some of these issues in court, right?
That is why we have an independent judiciary, isn’t it? But
you can forget about that, because even if your case surmounts the hurdles
to get into a courtroom, the Justice Department can cite the state-secrets
privilege to derail your efforts, whether or not anything that is actually
secret is about to be revealed. Obama has already cited the privilege more frequently than George W. Bush did in his eight years
in office.

So the question becomes, why do the
American people put up with the venality and outright criminality that
seem to have become part and parcel of our polity? Well, it could
easily be argued that most Americans have been sold a bill of goods
and, in exchange for material comforts and empty assurances, are
quite comfortable in having their liberties stripped from them.

I have recently finished a fascinating
book relating to the rise to power of former Italian Prime Minister
Silvio Berlusconi. The book, The Liberty of Servants: Berlusconi’s
Italy, is by Maurizio Viroli, who teaches politics at Princeton University.
Viroli’s arguments about what has happened in Italy and
how it developed culturally and politically resonated with me and made
much clearer the genesis of the political malaise that has engulfed
the United States.

Viroli explains that there are two
types of liberty. Given Italy’s historical and social context,
he describes them as the liberty of the servant and the liberty of the
citizen. In the United States, given our own history, it might
be more appropriate to refer to them as the citizen and the slave.
The slave or the servant might believe that he leads an enviable life
if he has a good master who only beats him occasionally. He may
have food, drink, a place to sleep, and freedom to do what he wishes.
But what makes him a servant or a slave is his unwillingness to address
his fundamental condition, that someone else has absolute power over
him and can do anything he wants at any time and for any or no reason.

In the modern context, a citizen of
a state can have what he thinks to be considerable freedom in his daily
life, but he will frequently fail to understand that he lacks real freedom.
Viroli calls it trading political liberty for private freedom. The freedom
that the slave possesses is an illusion, sometimes derived from a situation
that Viroli describes as a “veiled tyranny.” In a veiled tyranny,
the government takes office through legal or constitutional means but
gradually subverts the checks and balances that prevent it from behaving
arbitrarily. If the government is a good one, respectful of individual
rights and mindful of its limitations, there will be a constitution
in place that protects one from arbitrary rule or
capricious behavior by officials.

The constitution also protects the
individual from mob rule, since in a pure democracy
unchecked by constitutional restraints a majority can always vote in
laws that diminish the rights of the minority and that can lead to
autocratic rule. The constitutional system breaks down when an
individual (Berlusconi in the case of Italy) or a bipartisan system
of control (in the case of the United States) disregards the rules that it is
supposed to play by and becomes powerful enough to either ignore or
change the laws to its advantage and to the disadvantage of the average
citizen. This is precisely what has occurred in the United States
over the past 11 years, with an over-mighty executive completely
shifting the power relationship between the government and those who
are governed and passing laws that constantly erode the rights of the
individual. We the people now have little real power even if every
two years we are allowed to choose between two different forms of the
same despotism at the ballot box.

Viroli’s proposed solution for Italy,
a revival of civic sense and responsibility, is not exactly the formula
that would work for a larger and more diverse nation like the United
States. Here the problem is rooted in money, power relationships,
and the misguided belief that the law is somehow impartial and the government
not oppressive. Voters inhabit a comfort zone in which they have
material wealth but no real say in what happens in their lives. They
think they are free because they can choose from many brands of cereal
and flat-screen televisions, but their liberty is an illusion, the freedom
of a slave for all its emoluments. Reading the Constitution of
the United States and the Federalist Papers tells one what the liberty
of a citizen should be, as part of an engaged people that understands that citizenship
entails duties and responsibilities as well as benefits. Thomas
Jefferson said that “Every generation [of Americans] needs
a new revolution.” The American people must be prepared to defend
to the death their rights against all comers, including their own government.

201203908537 Responseshttp%3A%2F%2Foriginal.antiwar.com%2Fgiraldi%2F2012%2F02%2F29%2Fcorruption-and-the-citizen-american-style%2FCorruption+and+the+Citizen%2C+American-Style+2012-03-01+06%3A00%3A39Philip+Giraldihttp%3A%2F%2Foriginal.antiwar.com%2F%3Fp%3D2012039085 to “Corruption and the Citizen, American-Style”

" The American people must be prepared to defend to the death their rights against all comers, including their own government." It is at this point, most Amerikans groan mightily and go back to playing with the PS3's.

Great article because deal with the notion "American people" and his role.The problem is that American people not only is content to be slave but is convinced that this life is the better and should be impose everywhere by all means.It agree totally with slogans like America exceptionalism","we are a nation of leaders not of followers","American century and its responsibility for the whole world"etc
Here are the words of Iranian movie director while receiving Oscar prize,words which ,explained Huffy in a shameless chutzpa ,are addressed to Mr.Ahmadijnejad who threats Israel:"At this time many Iranians all over the world are watching us and I imagine them to be very happy. They are happy not just because of an important award or a film or a filmmaker, but because at the time when talk of war, intimidation and aggression is exchanged between politicians, the name of their country, Iran, is spoken here through her glorious culture. A rich and ancient culture that has been under heavy dust of politics. I proudly offer this honor to the people of my country, a people who respect all cultures and civilizations and despise hostility and resentment. Thank you very much."

This is a great article and illustrates perfectly the real state of liberty in the U.S. today. Yet we have the National Endowment for Democracy out in the world working to export this system to other countries that these same oligarchs wish to exploit or subjugate in some manner. Then they get outraged when a nation attempts to throws off its shackles by toppling our puppet as in Egypt. Worse, the people of Egypt then have the temerity to attempt to act independently by requiring our agents not to subvert and corrupt their country's politics in the American style. It they resist our oligarch's will, we bring in the planes and missiles, or at least the SpecOps, to overthrow their independent rulers. And then we scratch our heads and declare they hate us for our "freedom," and demand even less "liberty."

A good synopsis of what's been going on, and if Thomas Jefferson were around today, there's little doubt that he'd be yelling “Wise up and rise up!” from the rooftops.
My guess is that Goldman Sachs and pals have put their money on the cool ruler himself, Mr Hopey Changey to remain head of state for another four years, because they probably see him as the only thing left now between them and the pitchforks.
Never forget how bad things were before he arrived, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgfzqulvhlQ&fe… and consider how much worse it has become for the common people ever since. The bill for all of this skulduggery and corruption has finally landed on their doorsteps, and after Obama there will be only one course of action remaining. Benjamin Franklin gives it voice: “The refusal of King George III to allow the colonies to operate an honest money system, which freed the ordinary man from the clutches of the money manipulators, was probably the prime cause of the revolution.”
Call it the American Spring.

Who pays for the israeli lobbiests? I think it is nothing more than a ponzi scheme. Our congress gives israel 3 billion annually, in cash I think, and israel takes a small portion of that money to grease the coffers of our congress men and women to keep the cycle going.

Here is a quote…
"The U.S. gives Israel all of its economic and military aid directly in cash during the first month of the fiscal year, with no accounting required of how the funds are used. " http://ifamericansknew.org/stats/114bill.html

Philip, this is excellent. I wish you would follow up with an essay which ties in the loss of property rights to America's sad descent into tyranny. Not a materialist, one of Ron Paul's greatest truths harkening back to the Founders, is that political liberty depends to the highest degree on the private ownership of property and the enjoyment of the fruits of one's own labor. We have the illusion of ownership today. No one ever really "owns" their home outright after paying off their mortgage. Between property taxes and insurance, which they pay until their dying day, homeowners are essentially forced to buy their homes two or even three times over. This is not ownership, this is debt slavery.

Unsound money coupled with fractional reserve banking have given rise to today's vampiric rent-seeking elites, in and out of government. The rentiers have their tentacles in virtually every aspect of our transactional lives such that secure retirement is a dream of the past and living paycheck-to-paycheck is the present harsh reality. Degrading as this regime of rents and taxes is to society's stakeholders, it is a cruel farce for the Occupy Generation. Today's youth have absolutely no incentive to buy into this corrupt and broken system. And who can blame them.

For Americans to recognize the truth whereof Mr. Giraldi writes, they must first turn off the TV, stop diddling with their smart phones and begin to reflect and contemplate the reality of things greater than themselves, transcending time and place. For a people raised with the incitement of constant stimulation, this is, I fear, a tall order.

The word is "Sheeple." Aldous Huxley once said that tyranny need not be violent, it merely requires a velvet hand. The velvet hand in our American universe is mass consumption, over-medication, sexploitation, a destructive media culture and anti-intellectualism. We've lost our faith in humanity, religion, philosophy and spiritual endeavors, and instead put it in Oprah, corporations and War. Over 200 years since the Age of Enlightenment and we are devolving as a civilization – congrats!

it would be nice to see someone actually investigate the financial dealings of our politicians both before and after their public service. I would like to know how so many of them ended up on the boards or hedge funds or fortune 500 firms earning millions of dollars for only a few hours work per YEAR!! especially when they have no experience in finance or the private sector..

washington is so corrupt i think satan himself must have his global headquarters somewhere in our capital

We SHOULD be prepared to contribute the 'last full measure' in defense of our civil and political liberties….. but if we did that, we might miss the next episode of 'Dancing With the Stars'. Gotta have your priorities, right?

[…] In the modern context, a citizen of a state can have what he thinks to be considerable freedom in his daily life, but he will frequently fail to understand that he lacks real freedom. Viroli calls it trading political liberty for private freedom. The freedom that the slave possesses is an illusion, sometimes derived from a situation that Viroli describes as a “veiled tyranny.” In a veiled tyranny, the government takes office through legal or constitutional means but gradually subverts the checks and balances that prevent it from behaving arbitrarily. If the government is a good one, respectful of individual rights and mindful of its limitations, there will be a constitution in place that protects one from arbitrary rule or capricious behavior by officials. http://original.antiwar.com/giraldi/2012/02/29/corruption-and-the-citizen-american-style/ […]

Sheriff Joe Arpaio today held a press conference confirming the fact that "America" is utterly corrupt. Sheriff Joe's investigators have convincingly shown that Obama's birth certificate and his selective service registration card are fraudulent.

I suppose it is now common law that congressmen (congresspersons) are allowed to give the representation which is a constitutional right pertaining to the citizens who (qualified citizens) vote. If I can read, that's what the constitution says – that there are people (not artificial persons – who are created by an act of the state/nation – who categorically are derived from the power granted by the voters <the people>) who are entitled to representation.

Then, if these people are entitled to that representation, and nobody else is entitled to it (how else could it be that those who are NOT entitled to vote for the representative could conceivably be granted – not only representation, but better and more representation than the voters?

Is it a crime to interfere in the operation of the government? (in the execution of the duty of the congressman) Of course it is. Any judge who would deny that would have to be so corrupt as to beg impeachment.

So, it is clear that lobbying is at the very least, interfering with the duty of the congressman to his constituents and so is a conspiracy to impeded the proper and constitutional operation of congress.

That fact that it is so widespread and acceptable to (I'm sorry to say this but…) idiots who either can't or won't bother to read the law or think for 10 seconds about it, is no reason to tolerate it.

So, it is not legal. It is corruption. It is crime. It is punishable – I think Title 18 contains several specifications on which a successful prosecution could be constructed and undertaken.

The Occupy Generation is the first instance I have seen of an attempt to remove the money men from the power they have over everyone (through the government).

It may be messy and appear spasmodic and unintelligent, but like a simple multicelled animal, it has potential. I guess in the end what will make the difference is more dependent on how many of them will eventually 'join the in crowd' through political office, appointment or employment in service to the 'great satan' (the pigs who run things now) and how many can maintain their integrity and continue learning and teaching others that there is no way to freedom without a serious struggle. It can't be done by voting or contributing money, only by taking up the fight.
Here's to them! Here's to we old guys who have been yelling into empty canyons for years. :)
go occupado…

the first sentence above should read: I suppose it is now common law that congressmen (congresspersons) are allowed to give the representation which is a constitutional right pertaining to the citizens who (qualified citizens) vote – to someone who takes him to golf and dinner (cheap dates)."